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Abstract
This article traces the history of the Islamic courts movement in Mogadishu from its origins in the mid-1990s to the present. The argument challenges many of the generalized comments that have been made by other analysts regarding local support for the courts and their role in Somalia's ‘reconstruction’. It is shown that multilateral efforts to support Somalia have been undermined by the strategic concerns of other international actors – notably Ethiopia and the United States. Security in Somalia's capital, Mogadishu, has severely deteriorated since the US-backed Ethiopian intervention in the country. The Islamic Courts, which were ousted, had strong support in the country but fell victim to the influences of ‘extremist elements’ within the country and an Ethiopian power eager for the Courts’ downfall. The local standing of the Islamic Courts was damaged by their defeat, but the subsequent disorder has served to make their time in control appear as a ‘Golden Age’. Support for the Courts has been fairly consistent for over a decade and is therefore unlikely to melt away.
Acknowledgements
This article was commissioned as an Africa Programme Briefing Paper for Chatham House (AFP BP 07/02), through the Horn of Africa Group (www.chathamhouse.org). The Horn of Africa Group was established in January 2007 as a partnership between Chatham House, the Royal African Society, the Rift Valley Institute and the Centre for African Studies, University of London. The authors wish to acknowledge the encouragement and advice of Sally Healy OBE and the Africa Programme at Chatham House in the writing and preparation of this paper.
Notes
1. US Department of State, ‘Somalia: Eliminating the Terrorist Threat’.
2. Somalia fragmented into clan-ruled territories in 1991. Crucially, the Hawiye took centre stage because the clan inhabited the fertile south and the capital. Following the civil war, sub-clans of the same clan had rival interests; the Abgal sub-clan's dominance in Mogadishu is challenged by the other five sub-clans of the Hawiye.
3. For an assessment of political Islam in Somalia before the rise of the Islamic Courts’ ‘administration’ in 2006, see CitationMarchal, ‘Islamic Political Dynamics’.
4. The Ethiopian government was, it seems, responsible for the impression that the Transitional National Government was hand in glove with Al-Itihaad Al-Islaam. The Ethiopian case is given in Medhane CitationTadesse, Al-Ittihad.
5. Formed in September 2004 as a result of the 13th Somali peace conference hosted by the Kenyan government (first at Eldoret and then at Mgabathi) under the auspices of the regional Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) organization (representing the states of Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Sudan and Uganda).
6. It was widely rumoured that the Alliance was backed by the US security agencies; see for example CitationInternational Crisis Group, ‘Can the Somali Crisis be Contained?’
7. Led by the jihadi Sheikh Hasan Turki (a Darod Ogadeni); his role also played into the intra-Darod rivalry (Marehan-Majerteen-Ogaden) over Kismayo.
8. Abdullahi Yusuf's political connection with Ethiopia can be traced back to his escape to Ethiopia in 1978 following a failed coup attempt to topple Siyad Barre's government after Somalia's defeat in the (1977–78) war with Ethiopia over the Ogaden region. Exiled in Ethiopia, Yusuf helped form the Somali Salvation Front for which Ethiopia provided bases and military assistance. Though imprisoned following a detente between the Ethiopian dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam and his Somali counterpart Siyad Barre, Yusuf regained his freedom in 1991 when Meles Zenawi's Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front came to power. Ethiopia immediately assisted Yusuf's actions against an Al-Itihaad bid for power in his native Puntland region of north-east Somalia.
9. See for example, CitationUnited Nations, ‘Report of the Monitoring Group of Somalia’.
10. CitationHealy and Plaut, ‘Ethiopia and Eritrea’.
11. CitationCawthorne, ‘US says al Qaeda behind Somali Islamists’.
12. CitationUS Department of State, ‘Somalia: Eliminating the Terrorist Threat’.
13. ‘Somali gov't names Qaeda leader as fighting rages’, CitationReuters, 22 March 2007.
